Tan to Tamarind: Poems about the color brown, by Malathi Michelle Iyengar, ill. Jamel Akib. Children's Book Press, San Francisco, 2009. 978-0-89239-227-8

Summary: Many different shades of the color brown are celebrated in poetry and pictures.

Analysis: This is really lovely. The poetry and illustrations explore all the different places browns can be found -- sand, wood, old photographs, skin, hair, eyes, food... celebrating an array of different ages, cultures, and languages. I find the pictures more compelling than the poems, which are good, but just don't grab me as much as I feel they could. I like that it even has one light-skinned scene -- a brown-eyed grandmother and grandchild looking at old sepia-toned photographs -- which helps erase that often-implicit distinction between "pasty-pale people" and "everyone else". As is often the case, the fact that the book is poetry makes it a bit more accessible for older readers who would look askance at being read a picture book, but might enjoy a book of illustrated poems.

Repetition -- Each poem begins with a similar introduction: "Brown. Sepia brown. Inky, crinkly sepia brown." or "Brown. Sandalwood brown. Musky-scented sandalwood brown."

Illustrations: Warm, soft,full-page acrylics.

Rating: 4Q/4P

Curricular connections: Perfect for a 5th or 6th grade art or poetry unit. Students could draw or photograph shades of their own favorite color and/or write poems to go with each shade.

-- SLH